


Nude Dudes

by involuntaryorange



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Crack, Fluff and Crack, Humor, M/M, Nudity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-17
Updated: 2015-10-25
Packaged: 2018-04-21 04:18:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4814726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/involuntaryorange/pseuds/involuntaryorange
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ariadne had gotten Arthur the Nude Dudes gift certificate as a gag birthday present, and he’d had no intention of ever using it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by kedgeree11, who mentioned on Twitter that there was a housecleaning service in her area called "Nude Dude." _Of course_ I couldn't resist that premise.

Ariadne had gotten Arthur the Nude Dudes gift certificate as a gag birthday present, and he’d stuck it to his fridge with no intention of ever using it. He wasn’t big on letting strangers into his house, and to be honest, he found cleaning kind of relaxing. Plus there was the whole _naked_ thing; Arthur couldn’t even handle strippers, so the thought of some naked, oiled-up guy prancing around his house with a feather duster wasn’t exactly appealing (and would probably end with glitter all over his furniture).

But then Arthur’s parents called on a Thursday night and told him that, _surprise!_ , they’d be arriving in town the next day and staying for the weekend. Arthur still had 3000 words to write for a Friday afternoon deadline, and he’d been so preoccupied with the article that his house had fallen into a state of somewhat embarrassing squalor. He was standing in the kitchen at 9pm, drinking merlot straight from the bottle, when his eyes fell upon the gift certificate.

He dialed the number apprehensively.

“Hi, thank you for calling Nude Dudes! This is Angela speaking, how may I help you?”

“Um, hi, I don’t suppose there’s anyone there who could come clean my house tomorrow morning?”

Angela clicked her tongue and Arthur could hear the sound of her typing. After a few moments, she said, “You’re in luck! We just had a cancellation, so we can send over one of our cleaners at 9am.”

“That would be great,” Arthur said with a sigh of relief.

“He’s one of our most popular cleaners, as well. Our clients have rated his ass a five out of five.”

“I… really just need my house cleaned,” Arthur said, feeling slightly defensive.

“Oh, of course.” Arthur could practically _hear_ Angela wink. “Eames will be there at 9am tomorrow!”

“Thanks,” Arthur said, although Angela had already hung up.

***

Arthur worked through most of the night, finally collapsing into bed at around 6am. He rolled out of bed at 8:50 so that he’d have enough time to start the coffeemaker before the cleaner arrived.

The bell rang at 9 on the dot, and Arthur trudged to answer it, yawning as he swung the front door open. The man standing outside grinned widely and said “Hello! I’m Eames, and I’m here to clean your house.”

Arthur rubbed his eyes. Already this was more interaction than he was equipped to handle. “Arthur," he grunted. "Come on in.” He stood back as Eames walked into the foyer and dropped his cleaning supplies on the floor.

While Eames looked around the house, Arthur looked at Eames. He was… not what Arthur had expected from a naked housecleaning service. Which isn’t to say that he wasn’t attractive — he was _very_ attractive, and perhaps that was what surprised Arthur. He’d been expecting some waxed-and-tweezed Ken Doll with a chiseled jawline, a modeling agency reject who cleaned houses during the day and danced around a pole at night.

But Eames just… looked like a real person. A really _hot_ person, Arthur amended, looking at Eames’s mouth.

Arthur suddenly felt embarrassed, both at the state of the house and at the state of himself: standing there in ragged flannel pajama pants and a stained t-shirt, with what was no doubt an impressive case of bed hair. He cleared his throat, preparing to apologize for… something.

“Well,” Eames said, clapping his hands once and turning back to Arthur. “I think I get the gist of things. Any preference for where I start?”

Arthur shrugged. “I’m just going to be working in the kitchen all day, so do whatever you want.”

“Sounds good!” Eames said brightly. “I’ll just—“ and he started unbuttoning his shirt.

“Oh! Um.” Arthur started to reach out as though to still Eames’s hands but just wound up waving his hands around ineffectively. “You really don’t have to do that. I genuinely just needed a housecleaner, and I had a gift certificate that a friend got me as a joke…”

“Arthur,” Eames said, suddenly sober. “I take my job very seriously.” He looked Arthur in the eye. “And that job is naked maid. So if it’s all right with you…” He gestured to his shirt buttons.

Arthur swallowed. “No, uh, yeah, it’s fine, go ahead.”

Eames went to work, deftly unbuttoning his shirt until he could pull it over his head. Arthur examined his tattoos as he folded the shirt up neatly and placed it at the foot of the stairs. When Eames started unbuckling his belt, Arthur realized that he was just standing there staring like a total creep; he quickly looked away, pretending that the wall was extremely interesting. “I’m just gonna,” Arthur said, before flailing elegantly in the direction of the kitchen.

“All right,” Eames said, amusement evident in his voice. Out of the corner of his eye, Arthur could see Eames step out of his trousers unselfconsciously. He wasn’t wearing underwear.

Arthur made an involuntary noise, somewhere between a whimper and a cough, and fled to the kitchen.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At long last, the denouement! Thanks for all the kind words about the first half; hopefully the resolution will be satisfying. :-)

Arthur spent most of the morning plugging away at his article, somewhat soothed by the sounds of vacuuming and tidying coming from upstairs. He was relatively productive, filling in a bunch of sentences where he’d left notes like “INSERT TRANSITION HERE” and “FIND A WAY TO PHRASE THIS THAT DOESN’T SOUND SO FUCKING AWKWARD.” He was feeling pretty good about the way the day was shaping up, until Eames came into the kitchen to clean.

On the rare occasion that Arthur had hired a housecleaner in the past, he’d hated being around while the person was cleaning. It felt very leisure-class, like he should have his feet propped up on some sort of plush ottoman while he ate bonbons. It turned out that it was _not_ , in fact, less awkward when the housecleaner was naked.

“There’s more coffee if you’d like some,” he said, staring intensely at his screen.

“That’d be lovely, thanks,” Eames said, and walked over to the coffeemaker to pour himself a mug.

Arthur thought to himself that, of all the situations where he’d imagined offering coffee to a naked man in his kitchen, this was one of the least satisfying ones. 

In his peripheral vision, which was getting quite a workout today, Arthur watched Eames open up the oven and spray cleaner all over the inside. 

“Are you sure you should be using oven cleaner that close to your genitals?” he asked, before he could help himself.

Eames chuckled. “I only use organic cleaning products for precisely that reason. The worst thing that could happen is I wind up citrus-fresh. Although,” he added, “I _did_ once make the mistake of waxing right before a job. I would not recommend getting a vinegar-based cleaner on your freshly-denuded bollocks.”

Arthur hummed and nodded thoughtfully, as though it were perfectly normal to have a conversation about pubic grooming in his kitchen with a naked man wielding a spray bottle. He tried to add a sentence to his article, though he accidentally typed “penis” instead of “penalty.”

Eames leaned over to look into the fridge. Arthur accidentally inhaled his coffee.

When Arthur’s coughing had mostly died down and he’d accepted a glass of water from Eames while carefully keeping his eyes on the countertop, Eames spoke again. “You know, you _are_ allowed to look at me. That’s rather the point, after all. Unless I’m not your type.”

“No! I mean, no, you’re not not my type. I mean—“

“I understand what you meant,” Eames said, tossing a wink back over his shoulder while he threw what used to be a head of lettuce into the garbage.

“I just don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“Arthur. I’m cleaning your kitchen in the nuddy. What part of that suggests that I’d be made uncomfortable by a little ogling? Especially by _you_?”

Arthur wasn’t sure what that last part meant, so he ignored it. “I don’t want to, you know, objectify you.”

“So talk to me while you ogle. What are you working on?”

Arthur sighed and rubbed his eyes. “I’m trying to finish this article for the _New York Review of Books_.” 

Eames gave an impressed-sounding hum while he wiped down the outside of the fridge. “What’s it about?” 

“You really want to know? It’ll probably sound super boring.”

“Sure, I want to hear about it.”

Arthur drummed his fingers on the counter. “It’s about advances in art forgery detection, and the techniques forgers are developing for evading them.”

“Oh.” Eames paused where he was scrubbing at a bit of tomato sauce and glanced at Arthur. “That sounds fascinating, actually.”

“Yeah, well.” Arthur shrugged. “I mean, obviously I think it is; that’s why I chose to write about it. But it’s been a real pain in the ass to write. It turns out that forgers aren’t exactly champing at the bit to talk to a journalist about their techniques.”

“Hm. Did you offer them anonymity?”

“Of course! I think they mostly don’t want to share their secrets, though trust is probably an issue too.”

Eames turned to face Arthur and crossed his arms over his chest. Arthur admired the way it made his biceps look, then guiltily averted his gaze toward the wall, then remembered that it was okay to look and went back to admiring.

“I might be able to help you,” Eames said.

“Friends in low places?” Arthur joked. “It’s a bit late for me to start tracking down an anonymous source. This article is due in six hours.”

“You wouldn’t exactly… have to track him down,” Eames said, carefully.

Arthur stared at him. (At his face, that is.) “ _You_?”

Eames held his palms up defensively. “I’m not a thief, Arthur, I promise you. It was something I used to do recreationally.”

“I’m not worried you’re going to _steal_ from me,” Arthur said. “I’m just wondering why you’re working as a naked maid when you could be forging art. Are you bad at it?”

Eames smiled, small but not modest. “I’m very, very good at it.”

“So then why…?” _Are you cleaning my house with your dick out_ , Arthur didn’t finish.

Eames shrugged. “It’s an honest living. I’m good at cleaning and I’m good at being naked.”

Arthur couldn’t argue with either of those facts, since evidence of both of them were right in front of him. “So you’d be willing to talk to me? Anonymously?”

“Sure,” Eames said. “But only if I can choose my pseudonym. Ooh, can you give me a ridiculous American name?” He bounced with excitement. His penis jiggled. “Like Chuck. Or Hank.” 

“Uh. Neither of those really sounds like the name of an art forger.”

Eames pouted. It was unfairly adorable. “Fine. We’ll go with something Continental. Stefan?”

“I guess Stefan could work.”

“Excellent!” Eames picked up his bottle of kitchen cleaner and a rag. “So what do you need to know?”

For the next few hours, Arthur followed Eames around the house, grilling him on forgery techniques and filling in the gaps in his article as he went. Eames turned out to be a font of useful information — he may have stopped “mucking about” (his words) with forgery, but he apparently kept up-to-date on the latest advances in the field. He talked about ways to artificially age oil paints as he mopped the kitchen floor; he talked about the merits of different chemical treatments for canvases as he scrubbed the downstairs bath; he talked about how the internet changed the operations of the black market as he vacuumed the living room.

After a while, Arthur almost forgot that Eames was naked, so focused was he on their discussion. But then Eames would wring out a mop or stretch to dust a high shelf, and a flex of muscle would cause Arthur’s breath to catch. 

Eventually, when Eames had finished cleaning and Arthur had (reluctantly) sent his finished draft off to his editor, they wound up just sitting in the living room and talking, first about their jobs but quickly segueing into travel, both where they’d been and where they’d like to visit.

Arthur was so absorbed in their conversation that he almost jumped out of his seat when the doorbell rang. “Shit, that must be my parents!” He looked frantically around the room, then down at himself, then at Eames. “Shit, you’re naked!”

Eames looked down at his own body with surprise, as though he, too, had forgotten he wasn’t wearing clothing. “I’ll take care of it, darling, just go answer the door,” he said as he got up and walked out of the room.

Arthur didn’t have time to dwell on the pet name as he tried fruitlessly to finger-comb his hair. He contemplated running upstairs and finding a shirt that didn’t have a hole in it, but the doorbell rang again — his parents weren’t exactly the most patient people on earth — and he decided to just bite the bullet. He scrambled to the front door and opened it, trying to look as nonchalant as possible.

“Hi Mom, Hi Dad,” he said as they bustled into the foyer. His mother gathered him up in a bone-crushing hug and immediately began exclaiming about his appearance — “Arthur, honey, have you been eating enough?” “I’ve been fine, Mom.” “When was the last time you got a haircut?” “ _Mom_.” “I’m just _asking_ , Arthur.” His father gave him a slightly less vise-like hug and started talking about baseball as Arthur ushered them into the living room and sat them on the sofa.

Arthur was just beginning to relax into the familiar sounds of his father’s sports talk and his mother’s thinly-veiled criticisms (“this is a very _interesting_ pattern on your throw pillows”) when he heard the bathroom door open. His parents immediately stopped talking and swiveled their heads toward the doorway like hunting dogs; after a few moments, Eames walked in, thankfully fully clothed and looking completely casual. Arthur’s parents glanced from Eames to Arthur as the silence reached uncomfortable lengths.

“Um,” Arthur remarked eloquently, standing up. He realized with dismay that his “pulled a stressed-out all-nighter for work” outfit could also be construed as a “spent all night fucking” outfit. “This is Eames. He was just on his way out.” Arthur grabbed Eames by the arm and started dragging him towards the foyer.

“Lovely to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. —“ Eames began brightly, before very obviously realizing he didn’t know their last name. Arthur cringed.

“He doesn’t have to leave,” Arthur’s mother protested.

“Yes he does,” Arthur said, still herding Eames out of the room. 

When they got to the foyer, Eames began gathering up his cleaning supplies while Arthur buried his face in his hands and moaned. “Well, that wasn’t awkward _at all_.”

“I’ve been party to more awkward scenarios,” Eames reassured. “Believe me.”

Arthur laughed humorlessly. “Right, at least you were wearing clothes.”

“And it was your parents, not your wife.”

Arthur stared at Eames. “Has that actually _happened_?”

“Indeed it has. I snuck out while the client was trying to explain to his wife why there was a naked man dusting her doll collection. To be honest, I was mostly relieved that it wasn’t actually _his_ doll collection.”

Arthur couldn’t help but giggle at that, and once he started he couldn’t stop. Eames joined in, and soon they were both gasping for breath and wiping away tears.

“My parents,” Arthur managed, once he’d mostly regained his composure, “now think you’re some random guy I picked up at a club and spent all night and then all day banging.” 

Eames snorted and asked, “Is that better or worse than a naked maid who moonlights as an art forger?”

Arthur grinned. “It’s too bad I’ve outgrown my rebellious phase, I could totally milk this for maximum parental shockage.”

“Yes, too bad.” Eames’s smile suddenly muted.

And then they were just standing in the foyer awkwardly. Arthur had no idea how to end the interaction. He wanted to see Eames again, but he didn’t want to be that creep who hits on someone being paid to deal with him, and he _certainly_ didn’t want to seem like he thought Eames was a sex worker. So it appeared that his only options were to never see Eames again or to hire him to clean his house again, and _that_ would be the creepiest option of all.

His train of thought was interrupted by Eames clearing his throat. “Well, I’d better…” Eames said, gesturing toward the door.

“Right, sure,” Arthur said hurriedly, opening the door.

He watched as Eames picked up his buckets and walked out onto the stoop. He watched as Eames stopped a few steps away from the door and turned around to face him.

“Arthur,” Eames said, transferring both his buckets to one hand so that he could scratch the back of his neck with the other, “I apologize if this is inappropriate, but—“

“I’d love to go out with you,” Arthur blurted out, before he could think better of it. At Eames’s bemused look, Arthur rushed to clarify. “I mean, if that was what you were going to ask. But if you were just going to ask me to, like, refer you to my friends or something, then that’s fine, I could do that, and not because I’m interested in you, because you’re a good housecleaner, so I’d be recommending you to them for totally legitimate reasons—“

“Arthur,” Eames said again, thankfully cutting him off. “That _is_ what I was going to ask.”

“Oh. Okay, that’s good,” Arthur breathed. “Then, uh, my first answer still stands.” He looked down at where he was nervously toying with the largest of the holes in his t-shirt. “I promise I clean up better than this.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Eames said with a smirk. “I’ll text you, then? I already have your number.”

“Yeah, great. That sounds… great,” Arthur said lamely as he watched Eames turn and walk down the steps to the sidewalk. “I’ll talk to you later, then.”

“Goodbye for now, Arthur.” Eames gave him one last promising look over his shoulder as he strode away.

Arthur went back into his house and just stood there in the foyer for a moment, blinking. Then he took a deep breath and returned to the living room.

His parents watched him silently as he walked back to his chair and sat down. He stared back at them expectantly.

His mother was the first to speak. “So. Were those _tattoos_ I saw on his arms?”

“Yup,” Arthur said.

“That’s… interesting.”

_You don’t even know the half of it_ , Arthur thought giddily.

“Yup,” he said.

His phone chimed with a text alert in his pocket. He fished it out and unlocked it.

> _i also went to juvie when i was 16 for vandalism, if that helps with your parents ;-)_

Arthur stifled a laugh and returned his phone to his pocket. “So, how’s Rebecca doing?”

His father launched into a story about Arthur’s sister’s impractical new car, and Arthur leaned back in his chair and finally let his eyes close.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to kedgeree11, both for inspiring this story and for providing "Stefan" as Eames's pseudonym!
> 
> And yes, Hank and Chuck were references to "The Many Faces of Eames."


End file.
